Business Traveller (Asia-Pacific)
Solutions to your travel queries
Does EU Rule 261/2004 apply to the following situation? I was booked in paid business class to fly Boston (BOS) – Washington (IAD) – Frankfurt (FRA) – Malta (MLA) on a United Airlines (UA) ticket where the first two segments were on UA and the third was on Lufthansa (LH).
Due to the BOS – IAD flight being cancelled (for bad weather at Logan), UA booked me on Air France (AF) for BOS – Paris (CDG) and then LH for CDG-FRA-MLA, getting in about two hours after I was originally scheduled.
The connection time in CDG was 75 minutes and the AF BOS-CDG flight was delayed by about 15 minutes due to mechanical issues. It was all on one ticket and AF accepted the ticket. I had to transfer terminals in CDG and because of this and the other delay, I missed my CDG-FRA flight. AF said they weren’t responsible for rebooking me since UA booked an illegal connection and the minimum connection time for a terminal switch was two hours.
Luckily, I’m a 1K with UA (Star Alliance Gold) and the LH lounge staff at CDG was amazing and was able to rebook me on flights that were able to get me to Malta that same evening.
I ended up arriving at my destination over six hours late and per EU Rule 261/2004, I believe I’m due compensation for this.
I’ve reached out to both UA and AF on this matter and neither has responded as of yet. It’s been over a month since the travel took place and over three weeks since I’ve contacted them.
Any thoughts or suggestions?
Samir Bhatnagar, London
To clarify, EU261/2004 is a regulation establishing common rules on compensation and assistance to passengers in the event of denied boarding, flight cancellations, or long delays of flights.
If the scenario played out as outlined above, UA cannot be made liable under EU261/2004 because they did their due diligence by rebooking you onto the next best connection, on a carrier outside their own alliance (AF), to get you to Malta via CDG and FRA. According to the CDG website, the minimum connection time (MCT) between Terminal 2E and Terminal 1 is 75 minutes. UA therefore observed the rules when they booked you on a 75-minute connection, even if just. Moreover, UA is not a carrier based in an EU member state, which exempts them from EU261/2004.
If the events occurred as described and you are looking for compensation, then you should seek it from AF. From how it appears, you have missed your CDG-FRA connection because the original BOS-CDG AF flight was delayed as the aircraft went tech when still in BOS. This led to you having to make the connection at CDG in less than the MCT recommended by the airport, and eventually resulted in you missing the onward connections to Malta.
You said the original itinerary change in BOS would have gotten you into MLA with a two-hour delay. Eventually you arrived with delay of more than six hours, so the actual delay caused by AF was more than four hours. Am I right?
If that is the case AF should be liable to compensate you as the following section of EU261/2004 becomes applicable:
“Articles 5, 6 and 7 of Regulation EC 261/2004 must be interpreted as meaning that passengers whose flights are delayed may be treated, for the purposes of the application of the right to compensation, as passengers whose flights are cancelled and they may thus rely on the right to compensation laid down in Article 7 of the regulation where they suffer, on account of a flight delay, a loss of time equal to or in excess of three hours, that is, where they reach their final destination three hours or more after the arrival time originally scheduled by the air carrier.”
This case is very complex and touches a number of grey areas yet to be covered by the law. The European Commission is currently reviewing an extension and revision of EU261/2004.
I’m a 20-something that’s recently been bitten by the travel bug. I’ve been on lots of short Asian jaunts – Hanoi, Bangkok and Boracay, for example. All of these flights are short enough, but not terribly exciting. I would be so much happier with a glass of (complimentary) wine and an upgrade! What’s a girl got to do to get frequent flyer status? I probably won’t get to obtain status this year, so a year-long plan for next year would be good. Thanks in advance!
Charmaine Mirandilla, Hong Kong
There is no easy answer to your question. It would be best if you referred to our recent special report "Bang for your buck" available on businesstraveller.asia, which is a study identifying the best frequent flyer programmes across the three big alliances for the easiest way to attain status.
That said, I have to once again point to Aegean Airlines’ Miles & Bonus programme as it only requires 20,000 frequent flyer miles to get the coveted Star Alliance Gold status, offering lounge access, extra luggage and, if you’re lucky, perhaps the occasional upgrade.
If you’re based in Hong Kong and limited in the number of trips you can take in a year, I’d recommend you fly to the US East Coast, which should earn you some 16,000 miles in economy on United Airlines and then perhaps a trip down to Bali on Singapore Airlines for another 4,000-something miles – et voilà!